It’s happened to all of us: we order a brand new gadget from Amazon, tear open the brown box and discover our latest gizmo trapped, as if in amber, in some hard cased plastic shell that requires a serrated knife and the ritual sacrifice of a pinky digit to free.

On their part, Amazon did something cool last year: they made a decision to eliminate those hard-to-cut-through plastic shells and boxes stuffed with styrofoam wherever they can, labeling it a “frustration-free” packaging initiative that was beneficial to customers and the environment alike.

It’s worked pretty well so far, but not everything should be shipped without protection. Ask numerous Amazon customers who recently ordered a two terabyte Western Digital hard drive through Amazon, only to discover that the drive was deliver wrapped only in a plastic bag secured with cardboard hoops.

Now, hard drives are finicky things, and they don’t deal with jolting very well. No surprise, then, that most of them failed on arrival.

“I just got this hard drive. Guess what. DOA,” writes Sung M. Choi on Amazon’s website. “I heard clicking sounds and now I have to send it back. All this due to their lack of safe packaging. What were they thinking with their weak packaging?

It was just a goof, and Amazon has apologized and sent our replacement drives, but it just goes to show: when you ship out vulnerable gadgets, its better to err on the side of caution.